Rams win OT thriller in season opener

The Ryerson Rams men’s hockey team won their home opener 3-2 against the McGill Redmen in overtime on Friday night at the Mattamy Athletic Centre.

Domenic Alberga led the way in his first game as a Ram, adding an assist and scoring two goals including the winner midway through overtime.

Alberga’s goals were nearly identical, with him coming in all alone on a breakaway and firing a hard shot low blocker past the Redmen goalie Andrew Flemming.

“With the second one [in overtime] the ice was pretty bad so I knew I wasn’t deking,” Alberga said. “I scored the first time that way so I thought I might as well try again, and it worked.”

Before the winner was scored, all four goals were scored in the first period, with the Rams scoring within the first two minutes and the Redmen scoring in the final two minutes to tie it up at a 2-2.

Alberga was centering the line that will be looked upon to carry much of the offense this season for the Rams, with Jamie Wise and Dan Lombardi on his wings.

Wise scored the second goal of the game and Lombardi stole the puck from McGill multiple times, creating ample Ryerson scoring chances.

“Lombo is really quick and Wise has good hands so you just feed them the puck and then get open,” Alberga said. “We played better in their end and barely played in ours, so if we’re playing down there we are going to get results, and that’s what we did today.”

Both teams struggled on the power play as McGill went 1-5 and the Rams went 0-6.

Troy Passingham stood tall in the net for the Rams with 26 saves. But he almost cost the team the game in overtime when he went out to play the puck, but put it right on the stick of a Redmen. Passingham dove back into his net and made the save of the night, to keep the game tied 2-2.

“Big save, lucky save,” Passingham said. “I’ve probably have never made a save like that in my career.”

Coach Graham Wise was very happy with his team’s play, from all positions.

“I thought it was a total team effort from the goalie right on out,” said Wise. “We knew that they were very good and that we just had to be up to speed with them. I felt we responded very well.”

The Rams next game is at the Mattamy Athletic Centre Saturday against Ottawa Gee-Gees